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An 89-year-old heir could end up in prison after a court date on his 11th-hour bid for a new trial in a case that shook New York society.

A Georgia police sergeant is back on the job six years after being stabbed, almost fatally, six years ago.

A couple has filed a lawsuit against a South Florida sports bar where a deck collapsed into Biscayne Bay last week.

Your daily look at late-breaking news, upcoming events and the stories that will be talked about Thursday:

In a move that could send interest rates higher, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke ended weeks of speculation Wednesday by saying the Federal Reserve will likely slow its bond-buying program this year and end it next year because the economy is strengthening.

A federal judge in Baltimore said Wednesday she's satisfied for now with measures the military has taken to release documents related to Army Pfc. Bradley Manning's court-martial in the Wikileaks case.

North Carolina has repealed a landmark law that had allowed convicted murderers to have their sentences reduced to life in prison if they could prove racial bias influenced the outcome of their cases.

New York state and Eastman Kodak Co. have reached a deal that will keep some of the troubled company's operations in Rochester and provide $49 million for environmental cleanup at the once bustling Eastman Business Park.

Maine's blunt-spoken governor doesn't mince words when opponents dare to cross him but he's saved some of his harshest criticism for newspapers, once telling schoolchildren he isn't a fan of papers and another time saying that reading one is "like paying somebody to tell you lies."

A woman who quit her job to care for her elderly mother felt at a loss to support herself when the older woman died so she buried her in the yard of their Florida home and lived off her mother's Social Security checks for 14 years, her lawyers and federal authorities say.

A couple that prosecutors dubbed the "landlords from hell" for going to scary lengths to drive tenants from a San Francisco apartment building - including cutting holes in one tenant's floor with a power saw while he was still inside - have pleaded guilty to several felonies.

A serial killer convicted of murdering six people in a shooting spree that terrorized Phoenix in 2005 and 2006 was found dead Wednesday in his death row prison cell, officials said.

Car buyers increasingly want high-tech features like voice recognition and navigation. But they're not very forgiving of the car company when those systems fail.

Three people were shot to death and a fourth was critically injured Wednesday at a condominium building in Louisville, Ky., and police are saying the shootings appear to be domestic-related.

Beneath a swimming pool, under a horse farm and now a weed-grown field north of Detroit. For at least the third time in a decade, FBI agents grabbed shovels and combed through dirt and mud in the search for Jimmy Hoffa's remains or clues to the disappearance of the former Teamsters boss.

A 32-year-old Pennsylvania man with Down syndrome was so severely neglected by his family that his body was covered in scabies and he weighed just 69 pounds when he died, police said in charging his mother and two sisters with murder.

The U.S. Naval Academy on Wednesday charged three midshipmen - all current or former football players - with sexually assaulting a female student at an off-campus house in Annapolis more than a year ago.

The court's newest justices, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, have voted together in 97% of cases this term.

The owner of a Houston bus company has been indicted on federal charges stemming from the 2008 Texas crash that killed 17 people on their way to a religious conclave, authorities announced Wednesday.

OfficeMax Inc. and Office Depot Inc. want Illinois and Florida to compete to be the home of their combined headquarters if their proposed merger is approved by offering the best package of tax breaks that they can.

U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski has called on the Pentagon to increase oversight and accountability of military service academy superintendents in response to increasing rates of sexual assaults.

A U.S. Army veteran was confused and mistaken when he told authorities he fought with an al-Qaida group seeking to topple the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, his defense lawyer said Wednesday in court papers.

The relocation of Yellowstone National Park bison to tribal lands in Montana can resume, under a Wednesday ruling from the state's Supreme Court that revives a stalled conservation initiative for the animals.

An FBI excavation has turned up possible human remains at a home once occupied by a famed gangster who inspired Robert De Niro's character in the movie "Goodfellas," authorities said Wednesday.

The first of four suspects is due in federal court in a forced labor case alleging an Ohio woman was held captive with her child, threatened and made to do housework.

A man accused of fatally shooting a gay man walking with a companion in New York City's Greenwich Village afterward claimed that he opened fire because the victim "thought he was tough in front of his bitch," prosecutors said in court papers Tuesday.

A North Dakota judge on Wednesday agreed to combine a lawsuit that challenges a new requirement for doctors who perform abortions with litigation over a 2011 law that limits the use of drugs to terminate pregnancies.

A wooden beam that has long been the focus of the search for a 17th century shipwreck in northern Lake Michigan was not attached to a buried vessel as searchers had suspected, but still may have come from the elusive Griffin or some other ship, archaeologists said Wednesday.

A network of human rights groups on Wednesday criticized plans to include Chadian troops in a new U.N. peacekeeping force for Mali while Chad's military remains on a U.N. 'list of shame' for child recruitment. But U.N. officials made clear they had no intention of excluding a country whose soldiers are considered among the best African desert fighters.